Mohammad R. Ghanoonparvar

A. Shapur Shahbazi, Robyn C. Friend

(raqṣ). Single dancers or groups of dancers represented on pottery from prehistoric Iranian sites (e.g., Tepe Siyalk, Tepe Mūsīān) attest the antiquity of this art in Iran. According to Duris of Samos (apud Athenaeus, Deipnosophistae), the Achaemenid Persians learned to dance, just as they learned to ride horseback.